Last year American AAdvantage reduced the number of systemwide upgrades given to Executive Platinum members from 8 to 4. Don’t worry, fewer upgrade certificates didn’t make upgrades any easier to confirm. In fact they’ve even gotten tough to use domestically.
It’s still possible to earn more systemwide upgrades — 2 more if you hit 150,000 qualifying miles, and again at 200,000 qualifying miles. American had said that was it, it’s not possible to earn more than a total of 8 systemwide upgrades.
In the past American would award more systemwides to those ‘overachieving’ Executive Platinum members who asked for more, with the request granted or not on the basis of American’s view of the member’s value. It was strange that they claimed they would no longer do it.
And in fact we now know that they do. One member who had already received the full 8 systemwides and has since hit 300,000 qualifying miles (!) has received 4 more. He wrote,
Got an email from an AA Exec Liaison (?) from AA Customer Service saying she put a note in my account and would contact me upon completing 300K miles, which I find strange. She wrote “your account will be reviewed at that time to determine how to thank you further for your business.”
Is this a hint of CK? Would I just be getting additional SWUs? Thanks in advance.
He then circled back and shared a screen shot of his account with 2 more deposits of 2 systemwide upgrades apiece.
You probably have to be more profitable than the average Executive Platinum member for them to approve additional upgrades since it required a ‘review’ of the member’s account — if I had to guess a four- or five-eagle Helix score or its equivalent.
I’ve written about American’s measures of profitability before.
American has long tracked profitability, and assigned scores entirely apart from status level (‘Eagle rating’ and ‘Helix scores’) that have helped to determine whether to grant exceptions to policies.
Probably the best short discussion of Helix scores is this Travelingbetter.com thread.
Above average top tier elites in terms of value to American have been able to get their systemwide upgrades expirations extended in the past as well.
Continue reading American Will Keep Giving Some ‘Overachieving’ Elites More Systemwide Upgrades…